Building Your Own Chorus

Executives often rely on triangulation to determine the truth.  We get feedback from two or more people and triangulate to remove their personal biases in hopes of identifying the truth.  It isn’t a question of not believing people, there are bad actors who will attempt to deceive, but in most cases people’s view of the truth simply varies based on their personal experience and their area of focus.  These variances are magnified when information is communicated verbally as messages are subject to interpretation as they are received and then again as they are sent out to the next person through word choice, editing, and emphasis.  As an executive, I relied on triangulation to solve mysteries and to synthesize information, such as performance reviews, where there was no ready access to a definitive source of objective truth.

As an executive in business development, I occasionally relied on building my own chorus to help convince people that my recommended course of action was the correct course of action by broadcasting confirming information through other people or other communication channels.  Having heard similar messages more than once, a customer is more likely to believe that the message is credible without attempting to trace the source of the messages to determine if they all originated from the same person.  And even if the messages did originate from the same person, the fact that other people received those messages and sent them back out in similar fashion, despite their personal biases, could indicate broad support for that course of action.

Taking the approach of building your own chorus may require you to set aside your ego as others who pick up and repeat your recommendations may eventually come to view them as their own ideas. You have to decide what is more important, taking credit for your ideas or taking pleasure in knowing that your ideas influenced the outcome, perhaps quietly, and hopefully for the better.

The key thing to keep in mind when considering building your own chorus is your own belief in the success of your recommended course of action and your willingness to own the decision to take that action.  Simply getting people to agree to do something that isn’t in their best interest is not sustainable.  The best relationships, personal and business, are built on everyone being happy with the results.

Tips and Techniques:

• Use several communication channels to build your own chorus for your recommendations

• Set your ego aside and be prepared for others to take credit for your ideas

• Remember that building your own chorus should only be used to generate positive outcomes